Sick Day
by OverThexM00N
Summary: Mimi takes care of a sick Roger, who's reluctant at first to accept her help. Oneshot.


**Disclaimer:** Don't own Mimi, Roger, or Maureen.

A shadow was cast through his vision as she placed a cool hand on his burning forehead. Roger couldn't help but crack a smile at how nice it felt. Well, until his body decided to do that thing where it fluctuated the temperature again and he suddenly became cold. He opened his mouth to request some more blankets, but he knew in a few more minutes he'd be back to feeling like he was lost in the middle of the Sahara Desert once more. Besides, his voice came out barely above a whisper. And even if he was capable of speaking loudly enough it wouldn't matter; Mimi would have began to talk right over him anyway. "Is there any cold medicine left?"

Roger nodded sullenly but didn't say a word.

"Did you take any of it? Before I got here?"

Roger shook his head at the bright yellow smiley face on Mimi's shirt (which was all he could see from his semi-prone position), wanting to add that he had tried but couldn't swallow it, nor could he swallow his AZT pills. Before he could attempt to get another noise out, though, Mimi and the smiley face disappeared from view, leaving Roger's sensitive eyes open to attack from the lamp on his side table. He wrinkled his nose as the glaring light blinded him, then shoved his face forcefully into his mattress to finally stifle the sneeze that had been irking him for the past five minutes. He uttered a pitiable moan as this summoned more throbbing in his temples, then heard Mimi giggling in the doorway and offered her an irritated growl.

After four tries of choking down some cold medicine and an AZT pill with a glass of tap water, Roger rolled onto his other side and curled up into a ball. Mimi dimmed the light a bit and sat at the edge of his bed, talking to his back as she reached her arm over to stroke his feverishly-warm forehead. Seeing him cringe as she said his name unintentionally loud, she quickly lowered her voice. "Would you like me to stay?" she half-whispered.

A pause. "Well... you don't have to."

"Would you like me to?"

Another pause, this one filled with a few sniffles. "You can go back... to the party... I think I'll... be fi..."

Mimi withdrew her hand as she heard a muffled, though still fairly loud, sneeze from underneath the bungle of covers. "Seriously, Roger, I can stay," Mimi assured the lump beneath the blankets. "I really don't mind at all. I want to be with you. You always stay with me when I'm not well. Plus..." She lowered her voice. "I reeeally don't want to go back to Maureen's. That game of 'spin-the-bottle' was getting pretty intense. I didn't play of course; just watched."

Roger found it to be ironic that Maureen always seemed to throw parties when he himself was sick and confined to his apartment. He laughed weakly at the 'spin-the-bottle' comment, but this only brought on an onslaught of coughing. Mimi sighed and pulled her legs up onto the bed, lying her head on the pillow beside his. The hair on the back of his neck prickled as he felt Mimi's warm breath on his even warmer skin. Slowly he rolled over to face Mimi, who smiled at him, her brown eyes intent and focused on his own emerald ones. "Meems, I'm gonna get you sick," he scolded her almost inaudibly, voice laced with concern.

"Well... you need a hug or something." Mimi wrapped her arms around his burning body without warning and sat up, pressing the befuddled Roger's head against her shoulder and pulling him up with her.

Roger nearly pushed her away, but instead his arms dangled limply at his sides as Mimi began to soothingly rub his back. He always took care of Mimi whenever she got sick, which had become increasingly often, for the both of them. What he had now was just a cold, but even a mere cold could be a death sentence for someone with AIDS. But he didn't feel like he was dying, right now at least. He felt alright, better now that Mimi was holding him, comforting him. If she didn't catch his cold, she'd get sick from someone else, somewhere else, and he'd be right beside her when it happened, doing what she was doing now for him. Being there for her, like she was there for him.

Mimi was a fighter. She would be able to handle a cold. Especially if she had Roger there to encourage her, to joke with her and make her smile, even when the aching muscles and sore throat and throbbing head seemed to drain the last bits of happiness from her body.

"People share things in relationships," she offered simply, her voice returning him to the present. "And I guess that includes germs."

Roger chuckled again, his laughter muffled against Mimi's shirt, and this time he wasn't barraged by uncontrollable coughing afterwards. Mimi smiled at the sound of his uninterrupted laughter, lighthearted and genuinely content; it didn't sound like the laughter of a sick person at all. Still holding him in an embrace, she craned her neck to the side to kiss his heated forehead gently as they both lay back down again. She pushed her head farther up the pillow and began to stroke his hair again. She could feel his chest pressed against her's and felt his breathing become calmer as he gradually drifted off to sleep. Still, she continued to play with his hair, twirling it gently and running her fingers down to the back of his neck, before she too drifted off to sleep, her fingers still entwined in his hair.


End file.
